Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

 
  • Increase font size
  • Default font size
  • Decrease font size
Home Editorials of Interest Jerome F. Keating's writings Taiwan: Curious Questions, Why the Secrecy on Ma's Daughter's Marriage

Taiwan: Curious Questions, Why the Secrecy on Ma's Daughter's Marriage

Taiwan has many current pressing problems. How to get the economy rolling? What to do with China's constant threat to its democracy? What should it do about nuclear power? What about the Diaoyutai/Senkaku dispute? The list can go on and on, but mixed in all these is where is the heart of its president and where will he retire after his final three years are up, especially since his ratings continue at an all time low.

The questions of where he might retire etc. bring us back to why the secrecy of his daughter's marriage which broke last month?

Certainly, the first family deserves a certain amount of privacy, but privacy is not hiding something. Ma's daughter was married it appears a year ago to a Harvard schoolmate Allen Tsai, but Taiwan did not know about it till the following year and that only because a second ceremony/dinner was held in the Grand Hotel in Taiwan for select locals. It was not announced, but it is a lot harder for the first family to keep a secret in Taiwan, than it is in the USA.

No one has anything against private weddings and a wish to be free from Paparazzi, but when the daughter of a president of a country gets married and the country finds out a year later, the nagging question comes up, why so hush-hush?? It is almost as if the president does not want more than the marriage of his daughter known. Is he ashamed or embarrassed that other questions about the fact that he is president of Taiwan will come up?

This is more like hiding the wedding; and it is in someways a discredit to Taiwan's media that it took a year to find out--and that only because a second wedding was held in Taiwan.

So speculation arises, where would Ma retire to? His daughter is now living in Hong Kong, and that is where Ma was supposedly born. Would the president of a country choose to retire there and not in Taiwan? That does not say much for loyalty to one's country.

Source: Jerome F. Keating's writings



Add this page to your favorite Social Bookmarking websites
Reddit! Del.icio.us! Mixx! Google! Live! Facebook! StumbleUpon! Facebook! Twitter!  
 

Newsflash


>Former premier Yu Shyi-kun talks during a press conference in Taipei yesterday.
Photo: Wang Min-wei, Taipei Times

Former premier Yu Shyi-kun yesterday said that China affairs are not the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) priority and that the party should focus on the economy, winning a legislative majority and securing its long-term goal of making Taiwan an independent, sovereign nation.

Yu also said he encouraged cross-strait engagement, but had reservations toward former premier Frank Hsieh’s (謝長廷) initiative of “constitutional one china” (憲法一中).